Rebecca Day

One out of every two consumers who buy a Samsung connected TV is creating an account at Samsung.com to have access to apps via Samsung’s Smart Hub TV, said Jeff Siegel, senior vice president of global media sales at Rovi, speaking on a panel in Manhattan Wednesday on the future of TV and advertising. Rovi is a provider of a program guide for connected TVs and developer of an advertising platform it’s testing on Samsung and Sony connected TVs. Siegel told us click-through rates for consumers’ interaction with ads from Carnival and Hellmanns’s in the test have been “impressive.” He wouldn’t provide details, saying the company plans a detailed review of results at the end of the summer.

Vudu said 11 Vizio video products will come with a custom button on the remote control for one-step access to the Vudu screen for video streaming service. Products with the Vudu button include the E3D320VX, E3D420VX, and E3D470VX 3D TVs, the M320SR, M420SR, M420SV, M460SR, M470SV and M550SV LED LCD TVs and the VBR122 and VBR133 Blu-ray players. According to Caitlin Spaan, head of marketing at Vudu, additional manufacturers will offer the Vudu button feature but she wouldn’t provide company names. The feature isn’t manufacturer-dependent, she said. If users have a Vizio TV with the Vudu-button remote and an LG connected Blu-ray player, for example, they'll see the Vudu screen on the Vizio TV after pressing the button on the remote. Regarding the fee Vudu pays for the button to be included on Vizio remotes, Spaan said, “We cannot comment on our financial relationship with our manufacturers.”

Possible strategic benefits coming out of the proposed bid by Liberty Media for bookseller Barnes & Noble include “a digital platform that could extend beyond books into TV and movie sales,” said a report Friday by Jason Bazinet, analyst at Citi Global Markets. Bazinet also said a possible outcome of the proposed acquisition includes “a potential acquisition of Borders,” which filed for Chapter 11 in February. A combined Barnes & Noble and Borders would “likely result in significant synergies,” Bazinet said.

Driving store traffic and sales continue to be major challenges for Target, as the company reported Q1 sales for the quarter ended May 1 of $15.6 billion, up 2.8 percent from $15.2 billion in Q1 2010, CEO Gregg Steinhafel said in an earnings call Wednesday. Profit inched up 2.7 percent to $689 million. “Unusually strong profit” in the company’s credit card segment offset “softer than expected” sales, Steinhafel said, citing “economic headwinds” and high gas prices as factors that keep minimizing traffic in the stores. Steinhafel said the company’s non-discretionary business including food, beauty and health was solid, but it “struggled” in sales of electronics, movies and music and seasonal categories. To help drive sales of electronics and packaged media, the company created partnerships with singers Jennifer Hudson and Allison Crowe involving deluxe-edition CDs with additional content available only at Target. With the release of the movie Cars 2 in June, Target is planning themed marketing across various platforms including bedding, sleepwear and toys, according to Executive Vice President of Merchandising Kathryn Tesija. Overall for the quarter, Target expected to drive stronger top-line sales, Steinhafel said, “and we're disappointed that we didn’t deliver on that. We have to do better broadly across the store,” he said. Regarding the company’s recently launched trade-in program at its mobile locations, which allows customers to trade in electronics for store credit, Tesija said it is in 1,300 stores today and will be in 1,490 stores by the end of June. She said the company is pleased with results following the launch of My Target Tech, a free customer support service that’s resulted in a drop in product returns. The company opened six new stores in March, including one re-location, and expects to open 15 to 20 new stores in its current format in 2012 and will “slowly ramp up the pace” in following years, Steinhafel said. Target is on track to launch a new small urban format called City Target and expects to open five locations in four markets in 2012, Steinhafel said. The stores will be custom-designed to meet the appeal of local regions, he said. Target’s Canada expansion continues to move forward with plans to open 100-150 stores in 2013 and 2014 and “likely more than 200” stores over the next 10 years, he said. The company is preparing for the 2011 launch of its new online platform that’s “on-time and on-budget,” he said.

Continued weakness in consumer discretionary spending impacted Audiovox’s fiscal Q4 2011 accessory sales, which were down as a share of net sales by 5.8 percent over fiscal 2010, the company said in its Q4 2011 earnings call Tuesday. “Sales of consumer electronics industry-wide remain lower, and our accessory products are largely attachment to CE sales,” said CEO Patrick Lavelle. Accessory sales results were largely due to sales declines in clock radios, camcorders, voice recorders, and antennas, which had been “positively impacted” in 2010 by the digital TV transition, according to Vice President Michael Store. Higher OEM sales and gains in mobile video and mobile security were offset by lower sales in the company’s fulfillment group, including the defunct Flo TV, satellite radio and portable DVD, he said. Overall Q4 2011 sales were $138 million versus $150 million in the comparable fiscal 2010 period, he said.

Effects from the Japan earthquake have resulted in an “equilibrium in overall pricing” of LCD panels during April and May, with prices for some applications rising and others dipping indicating a period of “general uncertainty,” according to research from IHS iSuppli. Average pricing for large-sized LCD panels slipped 0.5 percent in April, the smallest decrease during the last nine months, IHS said. The price in May is expected to drop by even less: 0.1 percent. Notebook panel prices are forecast to rise 0.2 percent in May after climbing 0.4 percent in April, while monitor panel prices will inch up sequentially by 0.14 percent. Average television panel prices, however, will fall 0.6 percent for the month, IHS said.

Joseph Clayton, who helped launch DirecTV with RCA in 1994 and helped steer the launch of Sirius Satellite Radio in 2002, couldn’t resist the lure of a new chapter in the satellite business, he told Consumer Electronics Daily Monday. Clayton, who will assume the titles of president and CEO of Dish Network next month, joins Chairman Charlie Ergen, whom he described as “a visionary."

The number of films Sony Pictures will release in 3D will depend on the number of available 3D screens, Chris Cookson, president of Sony Pictures, told us at a 3D tech seminar at Sony America headquarters in New York. He noted that in 2009, Sony’s “Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs” had to be pulled “earlier than we would have wanted” because “Toy Story” was hitting 3D theaters a few weeks later and there were a limited number of screens available. Sony’s “Priest,” which released nationwide Friday, will face a similar challenge, Cookson said, when Disney’s “Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides” debuts in theaters May 20. “I wish we had more screens, but it’s getting better,” Cookson said, estimating that 20 percent of cinemas in the U.S. are 3D-ready.

Bassett Furniture is launching a line of entertainment cabinets custom-designed with a soundbar system from Boston Acoustics, the companies said Thursday at a New York briefing. The Nvelop line of credenzas, including two models in the Louis Philippe line and two Redin Park pieces, is priced from $1,499 to $1,999, the companies said.

TomTom said it expanded its real-time HD Traffic service to all Live models in its U.S. lineup as part of an effort to extend its “traffic manifesto” worldwide. HD Traffic launched in the U.S. with the GO 2535 M Live navigation unit last month, and this week the company slashed annual subscription for the service from $119.95 to $59.95.